Modern operating systems drive many of today's technology-based innovations by offering a platform for both hardware and software development while serving many diverse needs. These systems have evolved from more simplistic file management systems to more complex workstations that provide high-end performance at reasonable cost. Such systems often include multi-processing architectures, high-speed memory, advanced peripheral devices, a variety of system libraries and components to aid software development, and intricate/interleaved bus architectures, for example. At the core of these systems include sophisticated operating systems that manage not only computer-related hardware but, a vast array of software components having various relationships. These components are often described in terms of objects or classes having multi-tiered relationships such as in a hierarchical arrangement for files and directories that are found in many data management systems.
One aspect to managing data within the framework of an operating system or other data manager involves how various items are displayed to a user. For example, items created as documents may be kept in a document folder, whereas items created as a spreadsheet may be stored in a separate spreadsheet folder—if so desired by users creating such files. Currently, such designations as spreadsheet folder and document folder are somewhat arbitrary in that the user may also keep spreadsheets and documents in a single folder such as a working folder. After a plurality of such folders have been created having associated data items or files appearing in the respective folders, the folders may generally be viewed hierarchically in a common tree arrangement of folders and subfolders, wherein the items appearing in any selected folder are displayed as content to the user in a separate display area or pane. Items from non-selected folders however, can only be viewed when another folder is selected by the user. As can be appreciated, this type of selection process of drilling-up or drilling-down on folders and subfolders to view the content within a respective folder can be tedious, time-consuming, and inefficient. Also, when a plurality of items are viewed in a content pane, finding a particular item of interest can be problematic especially if many of the items are merely relating to a similar category or group, yet displayed as individual components having no apparent relationship between the components.